Ghost Stories of an Antiquary

In a cathedral town in southern France, an English scholar buys an old scrapbook from the sacristan, who seems strangely eager to sell it. In other stories a mezzotint of a country house changes each time it is looked at, an ash tree harbours a witch's curse, and a professor on holiday finds an old bronze whistle in the ruins of a Templar church and decides to blow it.

M. R. James (1862–1936) was a respected scholar of medieval manuscripts and head of King's College, Cambridge, and later of Eton. He wrote these stories to read aloud to friends at Christmas, and published them in 1904. Precise, dry and full of real antiquarian detail, they define the classic English ghost story. Read them on a winter evening.